Katie Spragg in residency at Hauser & Wirth Somerset, 2023. Photo: Catherine Garcia
In Residence: Katie Spragg
- 2 – 16 September 2023
Hauser & Wirth Somerset is delighted to welcome Katie Spragg as our artist-in-residence this September to conclude her multi-site project following visits to Braemar, Scotland in April and Menorca in May 2023.
This unique residency project draws upon reoccurring themes of care, community and the universality of plants within Spragg’s creative practice. At each location, she has explored the planted gardens and local natural landscapes of the Cairngorms, Illa del Rei and Somerset, alongside meeting local people through community engagement workshops.
The residency is in collaboration with Make Hauser & Wirth Somerset and will be accompanied by a series of community events and workshops. Works developed across this period, alongside outcomes made by participants during workshops, will be featured in an exhibition at Make Hauser & Wirth Somerset in November 2023.
Make is a natural extension of the wider Hauser & Wirth gallery ethos – embracing art, craft, gardens, food and architecture. Since launching in 2018 in Somerset, UK, Make has presented work by over 80 artist-makers, providing valuable insights into material-led processes and the rich narratives of their practices. Works exhibited by Make embrace material truth, provenance, sustainability and the value of emotional engagement with the handmade.
Katie Spragg is a ceramicist whose porcelain sculptures peer into our interconnected relationship with nature and living organisms, questioning the evolving patterns in which humans and plants co-exist. She is interested in the tension and space between managed and cultivated landscapes, as well as the tenacious resourcefulness of nature, pulling focus to the margins and intersections.
Combining clay with a range of processes, including animation and installation, Spragg creates work that aims to arouse curiosity, specifically the way that humans and plants co-exist. Through her work, Spragg hopes to encourage an appreciation for all aspects of the natural world and to find value in the overlooked nature that exists in urban spaces and vast natural landscapes.
Through workshops and projects, Spragg often creates work in response to the collaboration and participation of other people. She has previously worked with young people from Lambeth Young Carers and people with dementia through the Clay for Dementia programme at the Garden Museum, an Arts Council and National Lottery Heritage funded project in Lambeth Wilds (2019).